Tour de Pologne Stage 2: Boonen Tests his Sprint

Tour de Pologne Stage 2: Boonen Tests his Sprint

The 239km Stage 2 of Tour de Pologne was one where Tom Boonen decided to test his sprint, as the peloton caught solo rider Diego Caccia (Farnese-Vini Selle Italia) with in the final kilometers of a multiple lap circuit.

With 6km to go, Caccia was reeled in and Stijn Vandenbergh set the pace at the front as teams started to set out their leadout trains. In the final kilometer, Sky ProCycling had position at the front of the strung out peloton, Ben Swift, on the final turn in the last meters, took the victory for Sky ProCycling. Elia Viviani (Liquigas-Cannondale) was 2nd, and Boonen was 3rd.

The team looks next to a 201km stage on Thursday.

"We are happy about our race even if we didn't win," Sports Director Rik Van Slycke said. "For Tom it was important to try immediately a sprint after yesterday's crash, to leave behind a bad moment. He did it and with a bit of luck he could also have won. On the last turn, he came out of nowhere in the sprint to take third. Had he been in better position through the turn, or had a little more road left to sprint, he may have had a chance to win the stage. The team did a good job for him. The most important thing is that at the finish he was happy and relaxed. The crash now is only a bad memory and now we can focus on the next stages."

"On the last corner I turned in 10th position," Boonen said. "I had to wait a little bit to launch my sprint because I was boxed in. It was uphill, so I came very fast, but a little bit too late. I had to close the gap. Anyway things are better today. I wanted to try immediately today to try to win, so I could understand how it was after the crash. I'm happy about the answer I had. I would also like to congratulate Dries on his performance today at the Tour de France. It was great."